Tech —

Bye bye Betamax. Wish I cared.

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Betamax was the best thing ever. It could fly, cut hair, and even save kids trapped in deadly fires. The one thing it couldn't do was enable Sony to take their proprietary technology and ram it down everyone's throat. Hence, most of the world has VHS, not Betamax. That's too bad, of course, because VHS is technologically inferior to Betamax and rumor has it that angels cry every time you use a VHS tape.

Yet Sony chose to play its cards too close to its chest, while JVC (the inventor of VHS) shared its technology and trampled Betamax into relative oblivion. Nonetheless, Sony still hung on to Betamax, providing its technology to the few niche markets that use it, e.g., in TV production land, where our own Loki may be weeping. Why the somber mood? Sony has announced that they are discontinuing production of Betamax VCRs, marking the true beginning of the end for the 27 year old tech. The company will still see to the repair of existing units and the continued production of tapes for betacams, however.

While I tip my hat to a legend, I feel an odd urge to burn propriety Memory Sticks in protest, too.

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Ken Fisher
Ken is the founder & Editor-in-Chief of Ars Technica. A veteran of the IT industry and a scholar of antiquity, Ken studies the emergence of intellectual property regimes and their effects on culture and innovation. Emailken@arstechnica.com//Twitter@kenfisher